“If you can guess what’s in my pocket, O King,” the girl said, “you can have it.” She grinned. “Well, King, do you dare?”

The King knelt swiftly to meet her eyes. “I can have your head in a swipe if it pleases me,” he said. At his side the Queen kept deathly silent, his threat speaking for both of their majesties. The earthy scent of the girl’s blonde and disheveled hair—the scent of combat—infused truth into her next words.

“You know the battlefield I’ve traversed; you know on what river of risk and strategy I’ve sailed to reach you. And you know,” she whispered, pushing her face into his space, tickling his nose with the vanilla scent of her breath, “what befalls you if I’m taken.”

He slipped his gaze behind the little imp to survey the dark war beyond… Beneath the thundering sky men and horses lie slain; a fortress stood seized on the outskirts; the enemy advanced on all sides across the patchy land. Distant warriors watched for the fate of their girl before the rival King. He could see no escape.

The King looked at the imp. She smiled. “I am a wolf and clothed as a sheep, King,” she warned. “I advance on you with and without—with strategy and without mercy. And I’ll have this war, alive or dead.” She laughed. “What is in my pocket, King?”

He breathed heavily and filled her face with a harrumph. Her face held its glare, devious and daring. He rose to his full height, his eyes yet on hers, but his mind wandered… The war did not go well. He knew it as inescapably as he knew every corner of his throne. And here stood this imp of an enemy before him, enjoying his fall, mocking his threat, caring naught but for the riddle in her pocket.

“What worry should I give to what’s in your pocket?” he demanded.

“What’s in my pocket is what I’m going to do next. What I’m going to do next will be your doom. If you can guess it, I will choose another path and spare you a bit longer…maybe in time for you to save yourself and your ailing army.” The girl’s eyes gleamed. The Queen clenched the King’s arm. The night grew late.

The King gritted his teeth and his cheeks burned. “Am I to have a hint?” he bellowed.

“Look at the whole field,” she said, winking.

His eyes returned to the battle. Another fortress fell. The front lines were now broken. His most agile knight lie dead. His clergy had been captured. What hope in Heaven remained?

Her gentle voice drifted up to him on the dismal air. “I shall unleash it soon, King.”

Trembling, shaking, he looked at her pocket.

“King?” she sang sweetly to his shivering eyes. “King, can you guess?”

“YES!” In a flash the imp somersaulted to his right, brandishing a sleek silver dagger from her pocket, and sliced his dark Queen down dead.

“You said you would not!” he cried.

“IT IS WAR!” she shouted, laughed wildly, then said softly, “Pawn takes Queen. I am Queen now. Check and mate, Daddy.” She kissed her father’s nose, jumped from the board and the battle on her mother’s kitchen table, and skirted off to bed, giggling gloriously.

What a great week! Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven was the CLSC book for this week. Station Eleven is my favorite out of this year’s CLSC books and one of my favorites that I’ve read this year, so I was thrilled to hear Mandel speak about it.

I was even more excited after our interview — everything she told me was so thoughtful and eloquent, and we both agreed that King Lear is our favorite Shakespeare play. We also talked about Mad Men, so that was cool, too. Her talk on the book was amazing as well, and I was lucky enough to get to meet her afterwards. She also signed my book, so now I’ll treasure that forever. You can read my piece on her here!

The week ahead will be a fun one, too. Erik Larson and Héctor Tobar are both coming to visit to talk about Dead Wake and Deep Down Dark. Check back next week for my pieces on them!

This is the first book I’ve read for my world lit class that I’ll be taking in the fall, the focus of which is postcolonial literature. So yay for getting an early start on schoolwork!

Disgrace very obviously ties into the thematic framework of postcolonialism — a man and his daughter contend with the complicated legacy of colonialism in South Africa — so it’ll be interesting to discuss it in that context. There are also some references to Madame Bovary I found intriguing — if I end up exploring this book further for a paper, I might focus on those.

My main issue with the book was how apathetic I was toward nearly every character — David Lurie, the main character, is lecherous and just kind of gross. Lucy, his daughter, is such a closed book that it’s hard to get an impression of her.

I know a lot of this is Coetzee’s design. Part of what makes the book compelling is the dual narratives of disgrace that David and Lucy experience. The overall effect left me cold, though. And I felt like the dialogue between the characters didn’t feel very realistic or artistically true — no matter who was talking, it all sounded largely the same.

I’m interested to see how others in my class feel about this book and how my professor teaches it. I’m not quite sure what to make of it yet.

Have you read Disgrace? What did you think?

Rating: ***/*****

Quotes:

“Beauty does not own itself.” – J.M. Coetzee

“The more things change the more they remain the same. History repeating itself, though in a more modest vein. Perhaps history has learned a lesson.” – J.M. Coetzee

“Every woman I have been close to has taught me something about myself. To that extent they have made me a better person.” – J.M. Coetzee

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Fri, 31 Jul 2015 18:29:08 +0000brennasherrillhttps://brennasherrill.wordpress.com/2015/07/31/book-41-white-teeth-by-zadie-smith/Being productive is a wonderful feeling. Just moments ago, I finished reading Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, marking the first book I’ve read toward the upcoming semester’s reading list. I’m happy to report that I made a good decision in starting with a smart, funny, thoroughly entertaining novel.

White Teeth was already on my tentative reading list for 2015, so the fact that it ended up being an assigned text for a World Lit class I’m taking this fall worked nicely with my life plans. I went into reading White Teeth with very little knowledge of what it was about; I knew this was Smith’s first novel, took place primarily between the 1970s and 1990s in London, and was apparently funny. All good things, I suppose.

Turns out, the book is divided into four sections that shift focus among a pretty large ensemble of characters. We start with Archibald and Samad, friends since they served together in World War II, and then quickly branch out to meet their families over the course of several years. The book is full of culture clash, featuring characters of various racial, cultural, religious, and economical, and sexual backgrounds. Needless to say, this book leaves readers with a lot to think about.

Despite the complexity of the characters and story, White Teeth is an easy-to-read, funny book. Smith is able to write in a way that is eloquent and thought-provoking without ever being unapproachable. To me, this is an incredible and rare talent that makes me all the more interested in reading more of Smith’s works.

___________________________

Side note: another of the things I knew related to this book before reading it was that there’s an English miniseries adaptation of the novel. I did a presentation on adaptation for a class last fall, and the book I read on the subject had lots of discussion with Smith about her perceptions of the visual adaptation of her work. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a way to watch it yet, but I have high hopes of doing so sometime soon.

“Coffee in the Afternoon” first published in Fabula Argentea Magazine, October 2014

The blonde woman in the far corner of the café was not the reason he was here, but he wished she were. Her white button-up shirt was open wide at the collar and golden hair fell over her shoulders as she leaned forward, reading the books sprawled open on her table, holding a coffee in one hand and a pen in the other. A blonde curl dangled over her black square-framed glasses as she read. Johnny wished she was the reason he was here.

He hadn’t realized he’d been watching her, his thumb and fingers drumming absently on the café table at which he sat holding a mug of coffee. He knew he was staring after he’d thought she wasn’t the reason and hastily jerked away, splashing a bit of hot coffee over the brim onto the back of his hand. A few drops soaked into the paper of the large, white envelope resting face-down on the table. “Dammit,” he ejaculated, and, reaching for a napkin to clean himself up, he saw Jessica standing at the café entrance, a thin golden crucifix at her throat, looking down at him with her dark eyebrows raised.

Johnny shifted in his chair. With a soiled, crumpled tissue in his fingers, he stood shakily and gestured his wife toward him.

Jessica approached his table in the center of the quiet café. She was dressed stiffly in a blouse and skirt; the severity of her tightly-bundled brunette hair and her thin, straight lips vibrated in her strict movements; he waited as she slung her purse straps over the back of the chair across from him and glided into the seat. “You’ve grown your hair out,” she said tersely.

He reached both hands up to the beanie on his head, the crumpled napkin still in the fingers of one hand, and flattened the beanie down over the brown, curling locks protruding from under it. Stuttering a little, he replied, “Oh. Oh, w-well. After so many years of keeping it down—I thought I’d let it fly.” Over her shoulder, he noticed the evening sun disappearing behind the post office building across the street. A mail carrier stood at the bottom of the flag pole, lowering the flag slowly, letting the rope glide through his hands. Out of the corner of his eye, Johnny saw the blonde woman with the books. She was gazing up now, her chin raised, two fingers brushing her cheek. She was watching the flag come down. Johnny felt Jessica’s eyes, hot and black, and looked back to her. “I—I thought—I’d let it fly.”

Jessica looked down at her lap, smoothed her skirt over her thighs, and looked back up. “I hadn’t realized it had been so long. You’ve been away a while. We’ve missed you. You know that.”

“I—had some questions,” said Johnny. “Had some answers to find.”

“Away from me?” she asked.

“Away from the family, yes,” he answered, his grip tightening over the soiled napkin. He fiddled with it for a few seconds, then finally set it aside, his fingers slightly sticky. The blonde had returned to reading her books.

Jessica let her gaze fall to the porcelain mug on the table, next to the coffee-splattered envelope lying there, which she paid no mind. He felt tingles on the back of his hand where the coffee had splashed. She looked back at him. “Coffee in the afternoon?” she asked disapprovingly. “It gives you jitters.”

“I’m tired,” he answered feebly, his fingers jittering at the smooth handle. It was still hot and he hadn’t sipped it yet. He was still tired. The mail carrier across the street had the flag draped over his right shoulder and was ambling toward the door of the post office. Behind the post office in the direction he walked, the courthouse rose in the distance. Johnny pressed his jittery fingers onto the smooth surface of the envelope in front of him and stroked it softly, staring at the courthouse.

“So,” said Jessica, pulling his gaze to her, “I won’t grant you the divorce you requested.”

He stiffened, his breath catching in his chest. He fought to speak, but the words came out like splashes of coffee from a shaking mug. “Jessica, I’m—not trying—to upset—you—”

“This is your place for solitude, isn’t it?” she interrupted him. Her eyes bounced around the café in which they sat, taking in the soft mahogany tables and earthy green ficus trees, the dark oranges and browns coating the wide walls, decorated with paintings of landscapes and coffee beans and famous dead writers. A large mirror hung on the wall to her right, framing the two of them in its huge border, Jessica’s pale, severe countenance and suited body across from his stubbled, sun-kissed face, his body clothed in a second-hand jacket and jeans. Jessica eyed the patrons too—the newcomer murmuring for her coffee at the counter, the latecomer joining a group of smiling teenagers seated under the mirror, the regular whose fingers tap-danced over his laptop’s keyboard. Jessica looked at him and said with a curled lip, “This is your church now, isn’t it?”

Johnny noticed that Jessica hadn’t turned to see the blonde in the corner.

He shifted in the chair, wondered if his coffee had cooled, but it was yet too hot. “It’s—” he started, fumbling for the words rattling in his brain, pounding in his heart, “It’s a—a place that’s quiet. These people—don’t know each other. I’m not—tied to them. But I can—share this with them,” he said, encompassing the café with a steady gaze around. “It’s just a café, I know—but I can be with people, without—without them being—without having to—to give myself to them.” The liquid in his mug was dark, black, still. He regarded it solemnly and finished, “We can do our own thing, without having to consider each other. It’s peaceful here.”

“Selfish,” Jessica muttered. Johnny looked up. Her arms and legs were crossed, her thin chest very still under her severe gaze. “This is why you want your divorce, so you don’t have to consider me, your wife.” His eyes flicked over to the blonde. She was lounging in her chair, forgetting the books again and gazing out of the wide window next to her, towards the orange sun in the purpling sky. Sprawling, she had a hand at her mouth while the other lay on her jeans-covered thigh, one leg bent up and the other stretched out languidly. Her chest heaved deeply under her white shirt as she watched the sun slip behind the brown stone of the distant courthouse. “You vowed to love me and give yourself up to me,” Jessica said sharply.

Suddenly, the blonde looked at him.

She was smiling, or smirking. But he couldn’t tell if it was for him, or if the smirk had already been on her pink lips before this. But the blonde was looking at him, amused.

“Look at me, Johnny,” Jessica said. His eyes snapped back to hers. “Love me and give yourself up to me, Johnny,” she repeated. “Do you remember that? The family’s been asking after you, Johnny. They wonder where you’ve been. They speculate. They interrogate me. We’re tied together, that’s what these mean—” she reached for his left hand with hers and jerked it up in her grip. On a finger of her hand was a sparkling diamond ring. On the fingers of his hand was the vibrant kiss of a sun tan, smooth and unblemished. There was no mark of the thing left.

When she saw this, Jessica’s eyes went wide, her mouth agape. “So,” she breathed airily, “it has been a long time.” She sat back slowly in her chair, her cold hand dropping from his warm fingers, his hand falling slowly to the table. “Father will be disappointed,” she said. Then an icy tone returned to her voice. “You need to come back, Johnny. The family can fix you. This damaged heart, this lack of faith—we can restore it. There are some things that are closed to the power of man’s reason, to what he can do on his own. You can’t solve this yourself.”

Johnny bit the inside of his lip as she spoke. He hadn’t heard words like this in the six months since he’d left. Now, they clamped his chest tight. He felt as if the pain in his lip was the only thing connecting him to life—the physical pain was preferable to the deathlike fear gripping his heart. The beginnings of a tear liquefied in the corner of one of his eyes. He was shaking. He muttered in a trembling voice, “Until you, I never felt flawed.”

Silence. “Until me, Johnny?” she answered fiercely. “You were always flawed. We’re all flawed. I was your savior—you’re lucky that I was the one on the other side of the door when we met, willing to take you under my wing and introduce you to Father. The only thing you’ve done to save yourself was to open the door at our knock that day. And now you think you were fine just the way you were, behind that door, by yourself.”

He dabbed a dry portion of the soiled napkin at the corner of his eye, meeting her gaze again. “I shouldn’t have opened the door,” he admitted quietly, his voice steadying. “I should have left it shut—then I would have figured out that nothing was closed to me. Eventually. Would’ve seen that the world isn’t so evil. Everywhere you look—everywhere you look—it’s evil. But I’ve looked now. No, it’s not. It’s so good.”

She glared at him after this, an inquisitive air curving her dark eyebrows. She said, “What have you been doing these six months, Johnny? With whom have you been doing it?”

“Writing,” he answered, his chest still tight. “Writing,” he repeated. “Like I always wanted.”

“You never wanted it. You wanted to become a teacher. I remember the night.”

“I didn’t speak the night we sat with Father,” Johnny said abruptly. Her eyes flashed. He breathed gently, lowered his voice. “I didn’t—speak that night. We sat with the family and—and Father decided that my love for words should be my gift—for the family. I was supposed to read that—damned book cover-to-cover and then turn it into lectures for the family—tell them what was wrong with them and the evil world and how Father would make it right—”

He stopped. Jessica’s eyes had grown cold. A thin smile slipped over her mouth. In a long drawl, she hissed, “That’s Father’s job. To decide for us. Do you think you can decide the course of your life without at least his guidance?”

Johnny gulped slowly. His mouth was dry. A young man at the counter called out a coffee and a grinning teenager came and got it.

“Listen to you, Johnny,” Jessica said, draping her arm over the back of her chair and smirking. “You can’t even speak to me clearly.” He let her gaze hold him, feeling heavy in his chest, suddenly cautious. He looked down at the envelope as she continued casually, “Father thinks there’s someone else.” His eyes darted to the blonde. She wasn’t looking at him; she was studying. Had she ever been looking at him? His gaze slipped back to the envelope. Jessica continued, “He thinks you couldn’t really do this on your own. Someone had to be there, loving this little new-you. I was certain there wasn’t. There was only writing, and this place,” she indicated the café, “and wherever you’ve been living. Rented a room, did you?” She sneered. “How could you even pay for it?”

“A guest house,” he said, low. He reached into his coat and, shaking, pulled an item from it. “With this.” He held a pen straight up in the air between them, solid, black, metallic.

Jessica let her eyes rest on it. He saw movement over her shoulder. The blonde was gazing at it, too. He held his breath. “Soooo,” Jessica exhaled. They locked eyes again. “So, my—my. You’ve been writing.” Her gaze was steady, but he thought he saw her pupils shaking. Slowly, he pulled the pen back toward him, but stopped short, letting it linger in the air for a moment—letting the blonde see it a moment longer—then he tucked it away inside his coat pocket. Jessica said, distantly, “Whose name— Have you been using your name, my name?”

Jessica raised her chin slightly. “Time away, a place to live, work to do,” she said slowly— “You really expect to have this divorce.”

“I’m—” He paused, exhaled shortly. “I’m demanding it,” he stated.

“You’re disobeying Father,” she said coldly.

“He’s no longer my father,” he said hotly.

Johnny let his eyes dance toward the blonde, hoping to see her staring…but she was studying her books, yawning languidly with her face in her palm, paying him no mind, leisurely turning a page.

Jessica’s eyes hadn’t left his; she made no movement to look away. “I won’t grant this divorce. You’re going to Father and you’ll beg on your knees for his forgiveness, Johnny. That’s what a real man does, he gets on his knees. This boy you’ve become is ridiculous.”

He gripped his mug tightly. The coffee was still hot; no, it was warm; the heat was in his tightening grip. He laid his other hand flat against the envelope, pressing down hard. The heat of his hand rose into his chest. He met Jessica’s stare with his own. Steadfastly, he stated,

“I’m taking Lily.”

If Jessica had looked angry before this, she was now furious. The red flecks in her brown eyes burned. Her cheeks paled. He saw that the hand draped over her chair gripped the wood. Steadily, she began tapping a manicured fingernail on the tabletop. She said, tightly, quietly, “Like. Hell. You. Are.”

“I am—taking Lily,” he responded, gripping his coffee mug, bracing under her glare.

“Lily belongs to us,” Jessica said, not moving except her lips. “She belongs to the family. If you leave us, I’m not letting you take her with you.”

Behind Jessica, the sun had nearly set. Purple hues were oppressing the last vestiges of the orange afternoon. The courthouse had lit up from its base in the distance, gleaming despite the coming darkness. The blonde, he saw, shocked—she was standing, leaning a shoulder against the window, her fingers in her pockets. Her head was down, kicking listlessly at the café floor with her toes…until her eyes rolled to meet his, stealthily. She saw him looking and raised her face up and away from his, gazing toward the courthouse. Johnny pulled the crumpled napkin back into his fingers, and then he looked at Jessica.

“I want her to choose,” he said. “Lily can choose.”

“It’s not for her to choose,” Jessica retorted quickly, “when there is only one right way.”

“Then let her see the wrong ways,” Johnny answered. He was breathless. “I’ll show her all these wrong things with the world, and when she sees that they’re wrong, you can blame me. Blame me for it. I’ll hold the weight of it.”

The blonde turned smoothly and sat down, flipping gently through the pages of a large textbook that was open before her.

“We’ve already been through this with the Judge,” Jessica said, looking upward. “We decided this the day she was born.”

“No,” he said, “we haven’t been to see a judge. But we’re going.”

Swiftly, Johnny opened the flap of the thick envelope on the table and pulled from it one heavy sheet of paper. “Yours is in the post,” he stated, sliding the sheet in front of her. A court date was stamped in the corner. She did not look at it.

“Who’s advocating for you?” Jessica asked, looking downward.

“I’ll be my own advocate,” he responded, his gaze level.

Suddenly, Jessica shot forward, a fist landing on the piece of paper he’d slid to her, as she sputtered, “You haven’t been with her in six months, Johnny. You left the family and you left her in our care. You don’t get to walk back in and take her.” She sat straight. “You don’t know her anymore. She’s become deeply spiritual. She’s corresponding with an important church, reading their materials, contributing prolifically. She’s not the audacious little girl you so wanted her to be, flouting rules and running through the mud, godless except for you, godless like you. She’s hardly outside anymore. She’s pious. You should see how she locks herself in her room and reads and writes. The envelopes she gets and the responses she sends to the Holy Church of St. John’s, she’s never been as righteous as she is now—”

Slowly—slowly, because he thought that if he moved faster, his shaking hand would topple the coffee mug over the side of the table—slowly, he turned over the thick, white, coffee-stained envelope. Blazing up from its clean face was a shimmering, gold-embossed crucifix. Next to it, above an address, were the bold words that read, The Holy Church of St. John’s.

Jessica’s eyes lingered heavily on the face of the envelope, longer than it was needed to read the writing. In the upper left corner of its face there read Jessica’s home address, under the name Lily Flannery, scrawled in green, playful cursive.

Jessica’s gaze hadn’t moved. Johnny reached forward, steadily, and opened the envelope again, pulling from it the bulk of its contents. He flipped the thick stack of white pages over. At the top was a story title, and below it the words by Johnny Alice.

Scribbled across the thin top sheet, in the margins and between the lines, were the playfully cursive green markings that defined Lily’s name on the face of the envelope. This is so funny! said a scribble. Great set-up! said another. Cut the exposition, daddy… said another. There were dozens more. Through the thin sheet of paper, the underlying sheets could be discerned, with heavy green scrawls dancing around the thin, strict double-spaced text.

Jessica was leaning in so close that Johnny felt he need only whisper… “This is my latest story, Jessica,” he breathed. “I have been writing. And I’ve been doing it with Lily.”

Slowly, she raised her pale, tight face to his tanned, blushing cheeks. She spoke severely. “You have not been with us. This isn’t what she wants.”

The envelope was flat now, its bulk having been removed. But as the last bit of orange glow sidled amiably out of sight in the now-purple sky outside, Johnny reached into the envelope one last time and pulled from it the last item, sliding the single sheet of paper filled with green cursive writing in front of Jessica.

Dad,

I’m stifled here. Everyone is so interested in me and everything I do. And with all this mad attention, I don’t know who “I” am supposed to be! Get me out of it. Tell Mom—tell Jessica—I want out. She won’t believe me. Tell her I want to be with you. I don’t care how you tell her, just make her know it. Make her see what’s real, just once.

Your Little Angel,

Lilith Alice

Jessica did not move. With her head bent before him over the paper, she said gratingly, “She has to trust me.” She raised her face to his. “What can she know at her age? She needs to have faith,” she avowed, biting her tongue between her teeth.

“I’m,” he said, resolute, “taking Lily.”

“Come try it.” She sat up strictly. “I’m sitting in your place. I have the family, our congregation, our Father with me, everyone who knows what she needs far better than you do, Saint Johnny. What do you have?”

Johnny paused, his chest tightening—but it was not fear; it felt like a damning sensation, like he was the one damning her, and that that power belonged to him, to anyone who dared to use it.

He gripped his mug and lifted it to his lips, finally sipping his coffee. Over the brim, the blonde’s eyes met his. The coffee was warm, black, and bold. What did he have? Jessica had asked.

He set the mug down lightly on Lily’s letter.

“Righteousness,” he answered.

In a flash of fury, Jessica stood up so hard that her chair went skidding behind her. She seized the porcelain mug from his hand and raised it high over her head, then sent it shooting to the floor of the café, shattering it into dozens of pieces and exploding coffee in every direction.

The café went silent as John Mayer’s Stop This Train drifted dreamily through the air. The teenagers, the baristas, the regulars, and the stoppers-by all rested their wide eyes on Jessica, shocked. The blonde’s eyes were on Johnny; she was smiling.

“M-ma’am—m-miss,” a young man’s voice mumbled. The shuffle of the patrons rejoined the soft musings filling the air. “M-miss,” said the young barista, “are you al-lright, miss?” The boy had a brush and dustpan in one hand and a towel in the other, setting to work at their feet.

Jessica’s cold eyes were spikes aimed at his heart. In a smooth motion, she pulled her purse from the chair and lifted the straps over her shoulder. “Mmmm, Johnny,” she said silkily. “Johnny, Hell hath no fury like that of a woman scorned.”

Feeling his heart pounding in his chest, he inhaled deeply, and bowed his head to her in acceptance.

Jessica spun sharply on her raised heels and sped out of the café, into the coming night outside.

Johnny put a hand on the shaking shoulder of the boy before him. “It’s all right, son,” he said. The teenagers sitting beneath the wide mirror laughed furtively, murmuring comments about that crazy… Coffee beans ground behind him at the counter. The café resumed its faint hum. Where was she?

The blonde sat at her table adjusting her glasses, reading lazily, smiling and not looking at him. He fiddled with the soiled napkin again, gripped it in his fingers, and stood up quickly.

“Excuse me,” he said nervously as he approached her. The blonde raised her green eyes up to his face. “May I…” Johnny paused. The green eyes were clear, her porcelain cheeks soft and blushing from warmth, her pink lips gentle and full. His heart slowed, and he said in a deep, steady exhale, “May I spend the next few moments with you?”

She laughed out loud. “Well,” she said, chuckling, “I’ll take boldness like that as well as I’ll take a coffee in the afternoon.” She stretched her arms out to both sides and her chest heaved. “And right now,” she yawned, “I need one.” Then she added, “Who is she?” nodding to the table from which he’d come.

He turned. Back at his table, the barista had finished cleaning and stood up. Jessica’s presence was gone now. The barista winked at Johnny. Johnny grasped that the young man had heard their conversation; he’d get their coffees. Johnny turned back to the blonde and her question about Jessica. Who is she? “It doesn’t matter,” he said.

“Then it doesn’t.”

“You’re a scientist?” he asked. The books strewn before her were calculus and astronomy, chemistry and biology.

She laughed. “I’m a student of science. ‘Scientist’ is still a ways off.”

The barista placed two coffees on the table. “Please enjoy!” he said brightly, then bowed out.

Quietly, staring into the mug, Johnny said, “She’s going to have a hard time of it.”

“Did you know that?” the blonde asked.

He nodded. “We both knew it.” She said nothing. “It’s as if…” He paused, shuddering. “As if my whole world has stopped.”

She was still as she looked up at him. “Well,” she sighed, “they may try to stop it, try their damnedest to get you to stop it…and yet it moves. The world moves.”

“Can I…” He halted, taken aback at the electricity that had just jumped inside him. For the first time that afternoon, Johnny smiled. “Can I take you out for a drink?”

The blonde smiled too. Suddenly, she slammed her books shut, shaking the table and spilling a few drops of the hot coffee over the back of her hand. He reached out with the soiled napkin and wiped her clean. She stood up before him, a head shorter than he. Laughing, she answered, “No! I’m taking you for one.” Johnny beamed.

They split, retrieved their books and papers from their tables, each left two dollars on her table for the coffees, and they met at the café door, waving goodbye to the barista who was smiling after them.

Outside, night had come. The lights of the post office and courthouse blazed through it. “You know,” the blonde said at his side as he opened the door for her, “Heaven hath no glory like a self-righteous man.”

A little shocked, he simply looked at her and asked, “What makes you say that?”

She laughed and brushed his stubbled chin as she walked through the door. “Just the energy from an afternoon coffee,” she said. Johnny smiled, knowing she had reason enough.

The setting of this book is Calgary, Alberta–where I grew up. This pulled me deeper to the story because I found it exciting to read about places that I recognize like Kensington and the Calgary Tower.

Certain quotes within the first chapter spoke to me:
“I don’t make friends easily, because I think most people are useless idiots. I don’t see that as being a flaw on my part. There is no such thing as a “people person”; some people are just better at faking niceness.” — I am not much of a people person myself. This part reminded me of when I switched schools mid-way through grade 11 because of bullying issues I was dealing with. I was always a reserved person by nature, however this instance changed my life and this quote felt as if I had said it myself.
“Dating is extremely overrated. It’s a sick ploy for guys to show off their fast cars and their fast moves. Where would that leave me? Crunched up in some rank backseat with my pants around my ankles, or splattered all over the pavement like my sisters. Thanks, but I’ll pass.” — Again, I felt as if this writer had read my mind. You know a book is going to be good when the writer expresses some of your unspoken thoughts.

I am attracted to sadness when I read and so when I discovered that the main character is dealing with the deaths of her sisters I eagerly read on.

This book is realistic in that the main character Tamar, is constantly dealing with disappointment and new obstacles to overcome– she realizes that she is alive and she now needs to get her parents to see this too.

This book had me up at 3 AM because I couldn’t sleep without knowing the ending of the book.

I picked this book from the library shelf because I like to see how different children’s authors express sensitive topics like war.

Upon looking at the first pages of this book I am immediately in love with the drawings (real pictures of torn paper holes with drawings of tiny soldiers with their little weapons are sticking out)!

I notice that army green, grey, red and black are the only colours in this entire book other than the blank canvas of the page.

This book makes me sad to see the conditions of the soldiers and it reminds me of men I knew in high school who are now soldiers. Their faces are permanently serious and I wonder if they carry pictures of loved ones with them too?

Actual family photos (historical and in black and white) are in this book to help convey that this is real and a serious part of our contemporary lives and World history.

All along the reader can see that the two soldiers are similar in looks and actions, but it is still a BIG revelation when they discover for themselves that they are very similar. This part of the book is satisfying because the two characters are exhausted by this part of the book.

This book does not share the reason why the two soldiers are fighting (which is so compelling because war can sometimes be started over something seemingly insignificant), but it does show their struggles (ie. hunger and fatigue). Ultimately this book shares that the soldiers have been programmed to fight one another and how they forgot that the person they were trying to destroy is a human being with a family and a home they wish to return to.

When sharing this book with young students you don’t need to talk about war. For example, you can teach diversity appreciation in the classroom. Each student can get a stick drawing boy or girl (the drawings will all look the same) and each student can write about what makes them special and /or more than a student–because in the book the soldiers are more than just soldiers.

If the school has virtues and peace is one of the virtues this book can be used to introduce the concept of peace.

If there is an interest to share this book with older students, the authors have also created the Enemy: Older Reader’s Edition (2013), which I have not yet read and is pictured below.

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Mon, 27 Jul 2015 09:01:13 +0000JavWinsLit33https://lessnottyilliterati.wordpress.com/2015/07/27/a-review-of-the-wind-up-bird-chronicle-by-haruki-murakami/I used to think Murakami was kind of over-hyped. I read Kafka On The Shore 7 or 8 years ago and enjoyed it, but that was it (although recently I’ve been thinking about giving it a re-read.) So I didn’t have very big expectations for The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. I figured it’d be a little philosophical, a little romantic, a little weird and a lot self-indulgent. I was pleasantly surprised to find out it was indeed all those things BUT done far more beautifully done than I could have ever imagined or hoped, though I should have known better.

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is about a man who loses his cat and his wife, respectively. To go into too much detail about it would ultimately end up being a case of the partially blind leading the totally blind. Suffice to say the protagonist, Toru Okada, goes through a surrealistic psychological free-fall through something like parallel worlds wrapped up neatly in a few historical anomalies in an attempt to regain both cat and wife. He meets a lovely, though slightly sadistic teenage girl who serves as a kind of therapist for him in the midst of his trials, a pair of sisters with strange names and psychic powers, and a narcissistic, psychotic defiler is his arch-nemesis. Many of Murakami’s books deal with themes of loss, abandonment, re-emergence and redemption and this one does so with a definite nod to magical realism and metaphysical metaphor.

“To know one’s own state is not a simple matter. One cannot look directly at one’s own face with one’s own eyes, for example. One has no choice but to look at one’s reflection in the mirror. Through experience, we come to believe that the image is correct, but that is all.”

Murakami’s gifted writing takes mundane items and scenes that are familiar to us and turns them into wonders and horrors,talismans and dreamscapes. His transitions from the ordinary to the surreal are seamless, the characters he introduces extraordinary and accessible. They’re not people that we know personally, but people we are somehow very well acquainted with. My favorite character-a hyper-efficient, extremely well dressed young man who is known only as Cinnamon – is one of the most intriguing in the whole book. The second half of the novel rests on his very capable shoulders and the overt uncertainty of what is taking place around you makes his presence a comfort and a necessity- and he does all this without saying a word.

This book is fairly long at just over 600 pages, but it doesn’t really feel like 600 pages by the time you’re done with it. The experience of this book takes place in the universal subconscious- that part of us that we all share as human beings… if that makes any sense. Murakami’s gift is that he is able to communicate that experience in a way that doesn’t feel entirely foreign to the reader, nor does it feel forced. Though he deals with very similar themes throughout much of his work, it doesn’t feel like he is rehashing those themes mercilessly because he is able to communicate each experience differently from the last. The effect is a hazy, reverie-like quality that his novels have that many have attempted in their work but only a few can actually achieve as succinctly and as beautifully as Mr. Murakami does. His work might not be for everyone but it is definitely for most everyone- so don’t be intimidated by the length. What’s that phrase- “it’s not the size of the boat but the motion in the ocean”? (I know what it is supposed to be a reference to but it applies here quite well I think.)

So I stand corrected. Haruki Murakami is not only NOT the over-hyped marvel of modernity that I had originally assumed but is probably one of the finest literary voices that we have living today. I will definitely be reading more of his work in the future and I am very much looking forward to every last sentence.

Although Seirai is a relative newcomer to the Japanese literary scene, having won the Akutagawa Prize for his story collection Seisui (Holy Water) in 2001, he was born in 1958 and was 47 years old when Ground Zero, Nagasaki was first published in November 2006. Although its stories are all set in contemporary Japan, Ground Zero, Nagasaki is deeply engaged with themes of personal and historical legacy.

Each of the six stories in this collection is about the physical and emotional damage suffered by Christians living in Nagasaki in the wake of the atomic bombing. The memory of the atomic bomb is extremely subtle in most of the stories, but it’s never completely absent. Even more powerful than any real or imagined trauma generated by the bomb, however, are the moral dictates of Christianity, which demands that its adherents bear witness to suffering.

The second story, “Stone,” is narrated from the perspective of the brother of a Diet member who is being forced to resign from office because he hired his girlfriend as his secretary. While his brother is giving a talk to local business association at a hotel in Nagasaki, the narrator, a 45-year-old man who calls himself “Adam,” waits in the lobby, where he is approached by a female journalist named Shirotani. Adam is on the autism spectrum, and his conversation with Shirotani is almost frustratingly elliptic.

It gradually becomes clear that Adam’s mother is dying. She has sent Adam to intercept his brother in order to ask that the politician care for him, as he can’t live by himself. Shirotani, who has a brother like Adam, is sympathetic, but the author does not allow this story to become sentimental. Instead, the reader is hit with the full force of Adam’s sexual attraction as he fantasizes about the journalist: “If she wouldn’t marry me, at least I could carry her smell around with me. I would bury my face in her panties and inhale her woman’s scent to my heart’s content” (33). Adam’s mother has punished him for such thoughts in the past, asking him how he could dare to entertain such un-Christian notions “‘after our ancestors went to the stake with pure thoughts and prayers on their lips'” (32).

Adam’s brother Kutani is caught in a the grips of a similar moral vise. He entered politics for the most noble of reasons: to ensure that a doctrine of peace was represented at the highest levels of the Japanese government. The woman with whom he has cheated on his wife had come to him looking for a job after her husband’s family cast her out with her newborn son, who was born severely handicapped. Kutani explains to Adam that he initially wanted to help her as he wants to help all of his constituents, but that he couldn’t help falling in love with her. He says: “‘As long as I had her in my arms, nothing else mattered. Even if war had broken out and nuclear bombs were exploding all over the world, I probably wouldn’t have cared'” (41). His adherence to Christian doctrine, which has guided him along his path as a politician, allows no leeway for his identity as an individual. His affair with his secretary is merely an indication of a deeper emotional dissonance that has also estranged him from his mother and brother, who need him to be a person instead of a politician.

As Kutani struggles with his conscience in the penthouse suite of the hotel where he will offer his resignation, his brother is overwhelmed by feelings he doesn’t understand. After Adam leaves the hotel, he is afraid that his body will turn to stone in response to the emotional overload as it has in earlier catatonic episodes triggered by stressful situations. The story ends with Adam begging God to not leave him alone without a family and without ever having experienced intimacy, his longing for comfort inseparable from his sexual desire.

Another story that I found especially trenchant is “Shells,” which is also told from the perspective of a highly unreliable narrator. Six months ago, the narrator’s daughter Sayaka suddenly came down with a fever and ended up dying of a brain hemorrhage. Since then, he has become convinced that the ocean has been rising during the night, covering entire sections of the city and leaving behind cowrie shells and other assorted sea creatures in his highrise apartment. His delusions became so powerful and persistent that his wife has left him and his brother has placed him under outpatient psychiatric care.

While walking in his neighborhood one day, the narrator encounters an old man named Nagai who tells him that his late sister used to be friends of a sort with Sayaka. His sister had become senile, and the narrator’s daughter was the only one who would listen to her rambling stories. The narrator, overcome with gratitude, invites Nagai back to his apartment, where the old man tells him that his sister spent her entire life trying to forget the day of the atomic bomb, when she was forced to leave her siblings behind in a burning house as she fled with her mother. Nagai’s sister had once spoken to him about the sea of flames engulfing the city, saying, “‘I wish the sea would wash over it all,'” suggesting that she wished her memories would be washed away as well (146).

The narrator, who has his own fantasies of the sea, feels a connection with this woman, but he is terrified of losing his memories, specifically his memories of his daughter and the love he felt for her, which he describes as “the best and brightest, the truest feeling I have ever had” (117). He realizes that the shells that the ocean leaves behind for him every evening after the flood recedes are akin to physical manifestations of his memories, but this insight does not weaken his conviction that the city of Nagasaki sleeps under the waves every night. He tries to convince Nagai that his visions are real but fails. The story ends with his understanding that the saltwater coming in from the bay is not a purifying force like the Biblical deluge but rather indicative of a spiritual wasteland in which God allows the innocent to suffer and perish.

Obviously Ground Zero, Nagasaki is not light reading, and I found that I had to let a week or two pass between the stories, each of which stayed with me long after I had closed the book. Reading Seirai feels a lot like reading Ōe Kenzaburō, yet his style is pellucid where Ōe’s is confoundedly literary. Seirai’s narrators are not philosopher poets citing The Great European Male Thinkers in casual conversation, but this does not make them any less complex and compelling; their proximity to the mundane and mimetic “realness” serves to emphasize how the lasting reverberations of Nagasaki’s violent history have touched the lives of even the most unassuming of its citizens.

I would be remiss if I did not conclude this review by stating that Ground Zero, Nagasaki has the best book design I have seen in a long time. A faded image of the black circle on the cover, an inverse of the red rising sun of the Japanese flag, is on every page of the book, a reminder that the proverbial gross insult to human dignity in the room can never be ignored. Each chapter begins with a progressive series of diagrams illustrating how to fold an origami crane, indicating that somewhere inside this terrible mess is hope. These illustrations suggest that the reader, by sharing the experiences of these stories with the author, is in effect performing a symbolic act of prayer resembling the dedication of a chain of paper cranes to the atomic bomb victims. Kudos to designer Julia Kushnirsky!

Is Ground Zero, Nagasaki worth the $35 asking price for the hardcover? Yes, I think so.

Will the stories in this book be of interest to anyone outside of the academic field of Japanese literary studies? Absolutely. It’s not easy to read this book, but that’s a major part of what allows it to dig so deeply into the reader.

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Sun, 26 Jul 2015 14:50:48 +0000JanilleNGhttps://worldofmygreenheart.wordpress.com/2015/07/26/henryandclare/Well, I hope you’re all following me over on Twitter because things are really starting to get exciting!

Oh, how things can change so quickly! Last week, I was at a total loss for what quote to feature for my #JNGReads/#JNGListens post, but today, I’m struggling to pick just one quote from my weekly catalogue to highlight. I’ve fully delved into my next read, and the process has been incredibly quick and fluid. In an hour and a half bus ride, it seems like I can read more pages than I’ve ever been able to read before (even when I was studying for an MA!)…and the last time I felt this excited about reading during my commute was when I was nuzzled in the warm and familiar pages of Jane Eyre.

But, I guess this makes sense, as I am, after all, rereading another favourite, revisiting another set of close friends. I’ve cracked open the pages of Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveler’s Wife for the third time, and I have not been this happy while reading in a very long time. I’ve already written a blog entry about this amazing novel and its endearing, fascinating characters and so many passages from the beautiful prose feature on my ~Favourite Quotes~ page. I wrote that post when I hadn’t actually reread the actual book in awhile though…I wrote it based on what I remembered from the text, based on how well I know the story and how deeply it is engrained on my heart. The truth is, though, that I had started to forget some of the intricacies, some of the specific events and quotes that drew me into the book originally – and I have always had this theory that if you are starting to forget exact reasons, exact lines and phrases, that make you love your favourite book of all time, it is definitely the right moment to reopen its cover and familiarize yourself with it again.

So, that’s what I’ve been doing…and the love affair is still as overwhelming as it was the first time I encountered Henry DeTamble and Clare Abshire. I’ve spoken about how much I love Clare and how much I identify with her, and I’ve gushed over just how charming Henry is despite (or maybe because of) his challenges and troubles with time. But what I didn’t speak too much about is just how incredible Niffenegger’s writing style is…just how easy it is to fall into the prose, to get wrapped up in it, to sit comfily inside a paragraph or on top of a page and live there contentedly. Niffenegger masters two very different voices in her text – Henry’s and Clare’s – and she is so convincing writing as a middle aged man, as a young boy, as a middle aged woman and as a young girl. It’s absolutely inspiring and mindboggling to me, but it’s one of the aspects of this novel that sets it apart and makes it so memorable and touching!

And what’s perfect about all this is that there is no end to the number of quotes I can pull from this novel to feature on my Twitter page and on the blog. Like, let’s just say I have a bunch of quotes already selected for next week…and I am beyond excited both to share them with you, but also to keep reading and collect plenty more! For that reason, I think I’m going to feature all three of the quotes I picked from The Time Traveler’s Wife right here, below, so that you can all get a feel for Niffenegger’s masterful writing style and so that I can gush once more about how much I love every line in this text.

1) “Long ago, men went to sea, and women waited for them… Now I wait for Henry.”

The full version of this quote was featured in my last blog post about The Time Traveler’s Wife (click on the link above to read it)…so head over to that post to find out why I love it so much and why I think it’s a ridiculously good opening to such a heart wrenching romance.

2) “You may be Henry’s past, but I’m his future.”

Basically, this is the quote that every significant other needs in their life. As a girlfriend who has only ever had one boyfriend (awkward but truthful admission right there!), I take extreme inspiration from this quote because, let’s be honest, jealousy is a thing that happens sometimes, that’s outside our control, and it’s important to remember that people have pasts that can stay in the past and don’t have to meddle with the future.

3) “‘Who do you like?’ You, I think but don’t say.”

Henry DeTamble is a prince, and a respectful, compassionate, reasonable one at that. Don’t believe me? It’s quotes like this that express just how subtly charming he is, just how effortless his love for Clare is and how naturally it shines through in everything he says and does.

Alright, well there you have it! My love for The Time Traveler’s Wife basically knows no bounds, and I would even go so far as to say it has achieved Jane Eyre status for me…it’s definitely my modern/contemporary literature JE equivalent!

And before you go, I’ll leave you with this picture of the novel, looking as pretty as a peach because, you know, I was feeling photographical this morning!

Happy Sunday and see you tomorrow bright and early in the Twitter-verse!

On the morning of their fifth wedding anniversary, the clues to the annual treasure hunt have been placed, the gifts have been wrapped, breakfast made. There’s only one thing missing – Amy, Nick’s wife.

Gillian Flynn’s thriller deserves its bestseller status. From the very first page, the unsettled and unsettling nature of Nick’s narrative voice in the present time contrasts eerily with Amy’s cheerful, loving diary entries dated from before her disappearance, drawing you in and exploiting the reader’s temptation to assume the wife-murderer plot trope. But soon enough, the trope-rug is pulled out from under the reader’s feet. There are questions, inconsistencies, decoys. Nick denies its him, but Amy’s angelic voice from the past rings out eerily behind Nick’s strange, emotionless – indeed, seemingly loveless – behaviour.

But then the second section begins and everything is turned on its head. Flynn’s shift from past diary entry to Amy’s present post-disappearance voice kicks the narrative with a thrilling jarring force – Amy isn’t dead. Nick is innocent. Does that mean the reader can shift their sympathies, defend Nick indignantly against Amy’s deception? Well, no. We find out Nick’s having an affair with a student and suddenly things become a lot more complicated as Flynn picks at the threads of this superficially healthy marriage. And so the unravelling begins.

Flynn navigates the plot’s twists and turns with impressive skill, consistently keeping the reader intrigued. What makes this novel stand out within the domestic noir genre is the ethically complex issues it throws up: in an age of social media and mass published opinion, can a jury ever be impartial? how sincere are our ‘selves’ that we present to others? and do we even want to see what ‘self’ lies underneath? I’ve read articles that talk about the novel perpetuating ideas harmful to progressive feminism, such as the issue that Amy used a rape allegation to take revenge on an ex. In reality, transposing this idea onto society’s image of rape – that it is used by women as a weapon rather than being a seriously under-reported actuality – is obviously wrong and deeply misogynistic. Yet I can’t help feeling that if the focus of one’s opinion on this novel is the unethical, immoral elements of each character’s nature, then I think they’re missing the point. These characters are deeply, deeply flawed and should most definitely not be emulated. But these flaws are vital to the plot, they drive and enable the narrative to twist in the way it does – so uncomfortably, yet so irresistibly.

Perhaps my one niggle – which is actually quite a big niggle (a biggle?) – is the novel’s end. Throughout the book, the plot becomes more toxic, more twisted, that it is just ready for an explosive finale. Nick has discovered Amy’s plans; Amy has killed Desi and escaped, making a triumphant media return; the tension of these two characters seeing each other at their most vile is unbearable. With Amy having already committed a murder, and Nick very nearly committing it, one can’t even begin to imagine what might come next. But, as it turns out, neither could Flynn. The ending, for me, was a bit limp, with Amy manipulating Nick into staying together and acting the perfect husband – with constant paranoia of murder on both sides – because she is pregnant and he’ll never find a wife as ‘interesting’ as her. Something about this ending left me feeling a bit unsatisfied – I have no idea what ending I would want to be fair – but something about these two dynamite-streaked characters simply ‘pretending’ all over again seems a bit weak, a bit sickly for their narrative strength.

That said, this is definitely not a book I regret reading. Flynn’s plot, for the most part, is very cleverly constructed, thrillingly guiding the reader through this scathing portrait of modern marriage. A must-read, worth the hype. I’m now looking forward to watching the film!

Barcelona, 1945: A city slowly heals in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, and Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer’s son who mourns the loss of his mother, finds solace in a mysterious book entitled ‘The Shadow of the Wind’, by one Julián Carax. But when he sets out to find the author’s other works, he makes a shocking discovery: someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book Carax has written. In fact, Daniel may have the last of Carax’s books in existence. Soon Daniel’s seemingly innocent quest opens a door into one of Barcelona’s darkest secrets–an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love.

About a month ago, I posted that I was looking for a book that had originally been written in a language other than English for the Book Riot Read Harder Challenge. A huge thanks to reader and fellow blogger Richard for recommending The Shadow of the Wind to me. (Here’s a link to his review in case you’re want another opinion.) It only took me a few days to actually read the book, I’m just behind on posting the review. But man, what an introduction to world literature!

I know that I have this whole “verdict” section below but I have to say: TSotW is one of the most well-written books I’ve ever read. The language is gorgeous and the story keeps you guessing. The storytelling is so vivid you feel as though you have been plunked down onto the streets of Barcelona to witness the story unfold in person.

TSofW is about a boy named Daniel. When he’s 10, Daniel wakes up screaming one morning because he can’t remember his mother’s face. [His mother died when he was four.] Daniel’s father comforts him and decides to show him something secret. He tells Daniel to get dressed; they go out into the night so that Daniel’s father can introduce him to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books. Before entering the Cemetery, Daniel’s father makes him promise that he not tell anyone about the place.

The Cemetery of Forgotten Books sounds like heaven to me: a vast library of books that have been carefully preserved by a chosen few. A description from Daniel’s father:

“‘This is a place of mystery, Daniel, a sanctuary. Every book, every volume you see here, has a soul. The soul of the person who wrote it and of those who read it and lived and dreamed with it. Every time a book changes hands, every time someone runs his eyes down its pages, its spirit grows and strengthens.'”

I read that and my jaw dropped because it’s the most eloquent description of books and reading that I’ve ever encountered. Even better than just that description is the fact that the first time a new member visits the Cemetery he or she must choose a book to adopt, in order to “[make] sure that it will never disappear, that it will always stay alive.” The books might be forgotten right now but the idea is that each member will ensure that one book is never truly lost. Daniel looks around carefully and ultimately finds a book that stands out to him: The Shadow of the Wind by Julián Carax. After Daniel and his father leave, Daniel goes home and promptly reads the book cover to cover.

After finishing Carax’s novel, Daniel seeks out additional works by the author. Despite being very well written, Carax’s books are quite rare and the author is said to have died in a duel on his wedding day. On top of that, someone has been going around to any bookstore, library, or other location with copies of Carax’s works and burning them. This someone goes by the name of Laín Coubert, a character from Carax’s book The Shadow of the Wind–who also happens to be the devil. It’s possible that the only copy of The Shadow of the Wind is the one that Daniel adopted from the Cemetery.

The more Daniel uncovers about Carax, the more he longs to know Carax’s full life story–why he left Barcelona, how he died, and who killed him. By digging in to the mystery, Daniel sets in motion a chain of events from people who had been in the deceased-Carax’s life that he could never have predicted. While I did ultimately uncover who Coubert was prior to the end of the book, the reasoning behind the book burning was a complete mystery.

TSotW is a unique book with elements of young love, mystery, suspense–there were a few times I was definitely creeped out. I also enjoyed the Inception-style “book within a book” element of this story, and how Daniel’s life mirrors Julián’s in many ways. It’s beautifully written and well worth the read. Zafón also wrote a prequel (The Angel’s Game) and a sequel (The Prisoner of Heaven) in case you like this one. I imagine I will read them in the near future.

Verdict: This is one of the best books I’ve ever read and definitely the high point on my literary journey so far this year. TSotW feels like a book that’s been around for a long time, a classic you should have read in school perhaps, though it was only released about 10 years ago. It’s timeless and beautiful, definitely worth a re-read in a year or two.

Recommended for: anyone looking for a book originally written in a language other than English in order to check something off their reading challenge list. Or, you know…anybody. If you enjoy literary fiction and/or suspense, I don’t think you would go wrong to try this one out.

Current price: about $8.43 (Kindle), $9.81 (paperback), or $15.94 (hardcover) on Amazon.

Drawings are actually done by a wind drawing machine | Cameron Robbins | “The Wind Drawing Machines are installed in different locations to receive weather energy and translate it into an abstract format of ink drawings on paper. “, Found on cameronrobbins.com

What is the matter with the damned circle (or maybe free circus live edition?), can’t we get out of it ever? Funny thing this life, what you give is what you get, can’t help playing with matches til we burn our hands….. and they all have a great feast over the grieving bones…but, who cares? And while we swirl on the outline of the circle we play each other’s lives in exchange for white lies and careless thoughts… puppets engaged in an absurd drama. And the circle is small, exclusivist, yet, it’s obvious, that there might be several circles, several games, several themes… the worst of them is extended empathy, so avoid it, don’t, do not care, please walk away, forget, whatever. Unfortunately all the inhabitants of this one are there voluntarily, accepting in a numb state to pay several times the same debt, banks would praise these people.

Water sculpture – Shinichi Maruyama – 2009, Found on brydiebrown.tumblr.com

Eventually, if you’ve found what you love, you could as well let it kill you… Bukowski is always right, like Murphy, but in a more elevated manner. Just imagine yourself as the supper of Hannibal, cheers!
Postscript: nothing.

Jiro Yoshihara “Work” (1967), Found on weissesrauschen.tumblr.com

“This is my design!”,(”I let you know me, see me. I gave you a rare gift, but you didn’t want it ”) Mads Mikkelsen in Hannibal

The review states that “The strengths of Herrera’s work are undeniable. She offers insightful and nuanced interpretations of selected canonical Chicana writers […] focused on the interlocking structure of discriminatory discourses of classism, racism, sexism, and homophobia. Indeed, her discussion of queer Chicana motherhood and patriarchal heterosexism […] offers a very productive model for critically embedding queer representations of sexual and gender formation in the context of allied ‘straight’ texts. […] Herrera questions in important ways the matrix of discursive oppression that has historically shaped Chicana identities, while illuminating the potential for empowerment in creative rewritings of this script.”

The works which Dr. Herrera discusses are (along with brief descriptions) include:

Denise Chavez’s Face of Angel (1994): Described by Publishers Weekly as “an updated Pilgrim’s Progress with a Chicana feminist twist” where “there is never a dull moment in this rich polyphonic novel.”

Ana Castillo’s The Guardians (2007): the book section of Boston.com praises this “fifth novel [by] the award-winning poet, novelist, playwright, and essayist, [which] continues to mine history and make metaphors, fixing her critical eye on the treacherous divide between Mexico and the United States and the psychological and physical fallout of the illegal movement of humans, drugs, and money between Mexico and the so-called Land of Gold just beyond its northern border.

Sandra Cisneros’s Caramelo (2002): The Guardian describes this book as “a densely worked generational saga structured as a triptych linked by the voice of Celaya” that portrays “traditional Mexican femininity, in which girls are invisible until they become women, marry and procreate, whereupon they return to invisibility. In addition to the showing difficulties for Mexican women in contemporary America, it also “finds an echo in the simultaneous frustrations of being immigrants, working class, the wrong color and poor.”

Carla Trujillo’s What Night Brings (2003): The description from Amazon.com states that this is about a Chicano working-class family living in California during the 1960s in which the protagonist her family and God in order to find her identity, sexuality and freedom.

Melinda Palacio’s Ocotillo Dreams (2011): From Amazon.com’ s description : “Set in Chandler, Arizona, during the city’s infamous 1997 migrant sweeps, this riveting tale brings to life the social issues that arise from border policy and economic inequity.” Publishers Weekly states that this book “reveals a vibrantly painted desert culture of fragile beauty and uncompromising harshness.”

The New Sorrows of Young W.]]>https://psychedelly.net/2015/07/23/less-of-a-hopeless-romantic-about-the-new-sorrows-of-young-w/
Thu, 23 Jul 2015 10:44:00 +0000kwasnakaskahttps://psychedelly.net/2015/07/23/less-of-a-hopeless-romantic-about-the-new-sorrows-of-young-w/Edgar Wibeau is a youngster who seemed to be raised perfectly despite being a product of an incomplete family: an excellent student and hard-working apprentice is set as example to his fellow colleagues. Despite this, an event in the factory, where he stands up for himself for the first time, pushes him to change that happens to be crucial – and eternal.

Urlich Plenzdorf was a notable German playwright and writer, who was raised in the shackles of communist East Germany. Having studied philosophy, but eventually graduating with a film degree, he released a number of works crucial for “reading the contemporary German”. In the group of his most recognisable works, however, “The New Sorrows of Young W.” remains on top. Drawn to the matters of isolation, the differences between the rebellious individual and how the society influences them or how one responds to a big ideology, in 1972 he sat down to create a social critique of GDR’s social system that made him famous on both sides of Berlin Wall.

Before the novella came to life, the play under the same name was shown – and the sensations that comes with watching a dramatic work onstage definitely stays with the reworked piece. The book evolves around the messages which the protagonist sent to his friend; modern letters inspired by Goethe’s book and recorded on a few cassette tapes. The narration, based on his father’s conversations with his friends and colleagues in a profound urge of figuring out the events prior to his son’s death and the commentary of the ghostly presence of Edgar himself, lets the reader uncover the motivations behind the guy who suddenly changed, moved to Berlin from the small town of Mittenberg and started faking the life of a painter. Different angles create a captivating insight into Young W.’s life in Berlin and his process of growing up, stitching the fictional prose close enough to the feeling of reading non-fiction. Darkly realistic and a bit philosophical, it’s an experience of growing up packed into a story which could be one in millions. What can prove this theory is the similarity to “We Children from Banhof Zoo” by Chistiane F., based on real-life events. Despite being set in a far more liberal West Berlin, we get the shared characteristics of the era which fluctuated over the Iron Curtain. The confessionary character of the narration also brings the books together – and even if Plenzdorf’s piece is more conservative and his character more sensible, the feeling of rebellion still connects both books. Nevertheless, his crafty storytelling clearly marks the fiction while using the boundaries set for a documentary.

The protagonist’s habits and beliefs are carefully crafted, merging into a mosaic of a downright weirdo. It needs to be said that he might be the most wicked combination of Goethe and Salinger, with a need to venture, discover, live and negate. Trying to play a misunderstood genius, he declines most of second chances he gets while falling for a committed girl – and uses Werther’s lines to deliberately confuse people around, rightfully convinced that they won’t know their background or understand the meaning behind them. And he partly succeeds in the creating the image of himself – people think he’s a nutter, picking up his self-measurements and accepting them as their own. His narration is woven with relaxed speech and quotes, making him somewhat friendly despite the arrogance and overconfidence (which he doesn’t even bother to hide). The speeches of other characters don’t seem to say much about them, but there is plenty to read behind the lines: Dieter’s emotionlessness, Charlie’s uncertainty, Willi’s encouraging and caring personality. That contributes to revealing Edgar’s traits, too, in the longer run.

Although you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, Plenzdorf ‘s inspirations are clear from the first glance – the title bears an obvious reference to Goethe’s classic “Sorrows of Young Werther”. We have to remember, however, that the main character doesn’t really understand Werther’s suicide and argues with his behaviour in a clearly modern fashion – if it wasn’t for the tragic event, he wouldn’t go for that solution himself. Despite being less of a hopeless romantic than his role model, he’s an equal product of his times as his predecessor. Here reveals the attention to detail that the writer’s style bears: Edgar’s outfit consists of fashionable jeans instead of Werther’s iconic yellow camisole, he grows long hair to oppose the values implied at home, he loves jazz and looks for all the hip places around the capital to listen to live music. Even if he admires “that High Old German” and tries to express himself with the similar style to puzzle people, he uses mostly slang to speak his mid and is able to judge and respond critically to the accusations or guesses surrounding his death. Furthermore, the author also shares a few themes with J. D. Salinger, whose creation is intensely admired by Edgar. Holden Caulfield certainly influences his behaviour and sets his personal standards; he even compares Werther to the main character of “Catcher in the Rye”, stating that “this is the real life”; he even suggests that Salinger and Goethe “should meet up and talk” to figure out the weaknesses of the miserable protagonist of Romantic period.

What’s interesting about the book are the political ideas behind. Dieter becomes a symbol of communism that contradicts itself, indicating the class system embedded in a society aiming at being classless; an avid follower of this political orientation with Marx, Engels and Lenin on his bookshelves represents also the “new bourgeois”. Edgar both agrees to and criticises the ideology as he mocks his love interest’s partner. Even if the book doesn’t get up to becoming a huge manifesto, it does evaluate the conformism, both in terms of accepting values that seem to be useful or harmless and despising the widespread opinion without a true understanding. That almost touches Stanisław Mrożek’s “Tango” and his ideas of youthful revolution – to rebel against the (lack of) values, a young person needs to hit them with their distorted mirror image. Moreover, the vibe which the story brings captures the similarities in social critique and storytelling means between the two dramatists.

With a piece of writing so intelligent and “indie” from a modern perspective, Plenzdorf cleverly combines viewpoints of multiple narrators and blurs the line between the fiction and reality with the documentary concept. Using a set of images – or rather “podcasts”, as the reader is lead through the plot guided by the theatrical feeling which is possibly a product of how the story was told earlier – one enters the world of the young guy who is desperate to escape class limitations and the safe boundaries of his life. Honest, bohemian in its purport, deliberately political and unapologetically youthful, it becomes a window to the soul of a rebel in a society that was forced to adapt to sameness due to circumstances – and if you think of it, that becomes a clever lesson for young adults nowadays, in the society that values originality less and less.

PS. I was thinking of setting myself another reading list… and taking myself (and you, my dear Reader) on a literary trip around Europe till the end of my holidays. And the idea sprang to my mind while I was wasting my precious time while window-shopping in Waterstones again… so take this post as the beginning of a series or something.

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Thu, 23 Jul 2015 00:49:13 +0000Andrew Cattanachhttps://blog.booktopia.com.au/2015/07/23/donuts-now-that-we-have-your-attention-wed-like-to-talk-to-you-about-one-hundred-days-of-happiness-and-donuts/https://worldofmygreenheart.wordpress.com/2015/07/22/rejane/
Wed, 22 Jul 2015 23:48:27 +0000JanilleNGhttps://worldofmygreenheart.wordpress.com/2015/07/22/rejane/Well, I’ve just finished reading Re Jane by Patricia Park and I promised I would have a review for you all, so here it is…

Yes, I realize that opening sentence isn’t all that enthusiastic, and that fact pretty much reflects how I feel about the book itself. I’m not overwhelmingly passionate about it, it didn’t sweep me off my feet, and I don’t think I’ll be rushing to re-read it any time soon. It really is a shame because I am absolutely one of those people who adores reading modern adaptations and retellings of my favourite classic stories, and I had such high hopes for this particular novel. But, unfortunately, it paled in comparison to some of my preferred retellings of Jane Eyre (most notably April Lindner’s young adult version Jane which I wrote a quite impassioned review of here on the blog and which I have recommended endlessly to people!), and for some reason it just didn’t grab my attention or treat my favourite characters as lovingly as I would have liked.

Case and point is the portrayal of Mr. Rochester as Ed Farley, a male lead who lacks substance and personality. I’m of the opinion that Mr. Rochester is one of the most unique, easily distinguished male protagonists in literary history, and his manner of speech and particular history and circumstances are very distinct. Ed Farley, on the other hand, doesn’t really do much of anything, and when he does speak, his lines are flat, cliché and frankly not very interesting. I’ve read reviews that say that the novel is meant to be focused on Jane Re’s development and self-discovery, and I totally agree, but I don’t think that is an excuse for letting all the other characters (and especially a male character who is such a driving force in Jane’s narrative) act as stand-ins without any defining characteristics or traits. I just thought Park could’ve elaborated on her other characters a bit more thoroughly.

What I do think Park does well, however, is address a question I’ve always struggled with in my readings of Jane Eyre: Is Jane guilty or innocent? If you know the story of Jane Eyre and her romance with Mr. Rochester, you know that Jane falls for and is pursued by a man that is already married. In the world of the 19th century novel, Jane does not know that Mr. Rochester is married, and so I believe that most readers (myself included) do not place any blame on her shoulders for the quasi-infidelity that exists in the story. I would argue that Jane has no way of knowing that Bertha Mason Rochester exists – despite the fact that many creepy and unexplainable things occur at Thornfield Hall, I wouldn’t necessarily blame Jane for not jumping to the conclusion that her employer has a mad wife locked in his attic. I mean, it does seem a bit out of the ordinary, to say the least. So, I have never faulted Jane for her part in the adultery that Mr. Rochester intends to commit, and I can respect her as a literary character with a clear conscience.

On the other hand entirely, in Patricia Park’s adaptation, Jane Re acts as an au pair for both Ed Farley AND his wife Beth Mazer…and so the Bertha character (and Ed’s wife) is very much present in the novel. Jane Re knows that Ed is married and, more than that, she works for his wife and has a relationship (almost a friendship, really) with her. Jane is therefore aware of the fact that she is falling in love with a married man, and although she does feel some guilt, she tends to try to justify her actions by focusing on Beth’s shortcomings as a wife. This was something that bothered me more than a little while reading the novel and it was something that made me uncomfortable and that I couldn’t look past.

Bottom line, it was very difficult for me to like or identify with Jane Re because I totally disagreed with her decisions and actions. I just couldn’t warm up to her relationship with Ed (albeit short lived) because I recognized that Jane had deliberately betrayed an employer who had treated her with kindness and respect. Sure, I didn’t love Beth as a character either, but I don’t think she deserved to lose her husband and to be deceived in the way she was. While I saw Jane’s guilt and her struggle with what she had done a little bit, I didn’t feel she was as remorseful as she could have been and that made it hard for me to feel sorry for her.

I guess, if I had to summarize my feelings at all, I would say that I just didn’t love the structure of this adaptation as much as others I’ve read (like Lindner’s version, for example). I do believe that infidelity is an important subject that can be treated so eloquently and powerfully in literature, but I feel that this novel approached it in more of a nonchalant fashion and spent very little time (and very little literal space in the text) exploring it. Maybe I’m put off by the fact that it made me question Jane Eyre’s complicity in the original act of infidelity that inspired this adaptation, but I think more than that I felt that Park could’ve delved deeper and gone further with her investigation of Jane Re’s guilt and the effect of her choices on a married couple and their child.

So, basically, this is another post that sadly lacks passion and my usual excitement. But hopefully that is about to change as I delve into a novel I’ve loved for years…and begin reading The Time Traveler’s Wife for the third time! I’m super happy to hang out with Henry and Clare again, and I’m going to have a lot to say about them, so stay tuned!

My heart stopped. I pre-ordered Jen’s new book FIVE months ago! I sent an email to her as soon as I got back to my desk, and at 9 o’clock last night, she responded.

Imagine: you’re chasing your puppy around your apartment because he has stolen yet another paper towel while you were packing your lunch. You’re cranky because this wild chase means you’re missing key moments of The Bachelorette: Men Tell All, and you’re hungry because packing your lunch reminded you that dinner was three hours ago and you could really go for some ice cream right about now. In the midst of your bad mood, your phone goes off. You wrench the paper towel from your dog’s mouth, scold him appropriately, and go check for a message from your sister about how the new bachelorette is making a fool of herself tonight. But, no. Your phone chiming is not a text message, it’s an email.

It’s an email from one of your most favorite authors of all time.

You scream.

Getting an email from Jennifer E Smith is probably one of my most exciting “celebrity” encounters to date. Once, in Edinburgh, I stumbled upon Wills, Kate, and HRM the Queen, but it’s not like any of them wrote me an email. E. Lockhart (author of We Were Liars) favorited one of my tweets and tweeted back a very sweet, “Thank you!” last year. Lauren Oliver (author of Panic) has also favorited several of my tweets.

The encounters I have had with these authors mean so much to me because their books mean so much to me. What if you got to meet the director of one of your favorite movies? Or a developer from your favorite video game called you on the phone? To get a glimpse of the genius who created something that impacted your life is sublime. Jen’s email left me feeling awed, inspired, excited, and giddy. I felt noticed. Acknowledged.

Jennifer E Smith is known as a writer of novels, but let me tell you, her emails are pretty badass too.